From the Rolls-Royce experimental archive: a quarter of a million communications from Rolls-Royce, 1906 to 1960's. Documents from the Sir Henry Royce Memorial Foundation (SHRMF).
Steering improvements, the shimmy shackle, axle arrangements, and comparisons to American car designs.
| Identifier | ExFiles\Box 17\4\ Scan031 | |
| Date | 7th June 1932 | |
| Y7430. c. From HS{Lord Ernest Hives - Chair}/Re. c. to AG. c. to Mor. c. to R.{Sir Henry Royce} c. to BV. c. to Da.{Bernard Day - Chassis Design} HA/Hs.{Lord Ernest Hives - Chair}1/M.7.6.32. STEERINGS. With reference to R.S/M.30.5.32. SHIMMY SHACKLE. A certain amount of work has been done recently on steerings and the most important improvement which has been evolved during the past twelve months has been the shimmy shackle. Whilst this has undoubtedly taken a lot of road reaction from the passengers hands it has not compensated for the bad effect which low rating front springs and soft shock absorbers have had upon the steering of the car. Our steering on left-hand cars, even with the shimmy shackle fitted, is therefore slightly inferior to what it was on the original Phantom II. During the same period the Americans have certainly improved their steering enormously, even on their big cars like Cadillac and Pierce Arrow, and therefore we have to catch up with them again in this respect. Our own tests prove that only part of their steering excellence is due to the shimmy shackle. AXLE ARRANGEMENT. We have been studying their construction to see if we can learn anything. Their almost universal procedure appears to be a big transverse pivot inclination (about 7°), which gives them almost centre point steering; very much the same as our original front wheel brake axles on V series. The advantage of this pivot inclination is that they, increased their self centreing but in doing so we know must make the steering heavy. To overcome this trouble they mount the pivots on ball bearings and put back the friction thus lost, on the cross steering tube. They can have more friction on the cross steering tube than we can without the steering failing to return on a corner because of the 7° king pin angle. | ||